This invention relates to vehicle instrument panel lighting and, more particularly, to a light distributing assembly that evenly disperses light to illuminate a vehicle display graphic.
Vehicle instrument panels often include a vehicle display that communicates information, such as a speed of the vehicle, to an occupant of the vehicle. A typical vehicle display includes an ink printed display surface supported by a housing. The housing also supports a printed circuit board having several light sources that illuminate the printed display surface.
Disadvantageously, portions of the display surface that are near one of the light sources may appear to the vehicle occupant to be brightly illuminated, while portions that are remote from one of the light sources may appear to be dimmer. This difference in illumination levels provides an undesirable appearance to the instrument panel and may detract from the appearance of quality of the vehicle. One proposed solution includes using additional light sources to provide additional illumination for the remote portions. However, this solution adds expense to the instrument panel and requires additional space on the printed circuit board and in the housing.
Accordingly, there is a need for a light distributing assembly that utilizes a single light source to uniformly illuminate the vehicle display.